Physics Finale and Grimm's Break

Gabriel has come to the end of his physics block this week, and overall it seems to have been a success.  We were working on magnestism, and Gabriel and Arden both really enjoyed it.  Magnets and their amazing abilities to repel and attract, go down very well with little people it seems.

Gabriel also worked on a lead pencil version of his drawing from last week- it seems to have helped his shading quite a bit doing a colour version.

Willow is working through the second part of her block on history; focusing on the French Revolution and reading the Scarlet Pimpernel.  As part of this part of her history block, she will be looking into class systems around the world.

Arden and I read the 'Three Spinsters' out of Grimm's this week, and worked on the letterss 'y' and 'g'.  'Y' was a small sewing project- the first that he's done, and he really enjoyed it.  Here's our sewing- my 'y' is on the left, and Arden's is on the right.

This is Arden's and my modelling this week.  I did the word 'golly' and he did the letters 'e','g' and 'y'.

Outings

Last weekend was rather busy, with us hiring a car to head out to Yangchep national park, as Willow had won a limestone cave tour for her and some friends.  Arden and I went for a walk, as the tour was only suitable for 8yrs and up.  After we left Yangchep we went further North, and visited the Pinnacles.  I hadn't realised that the Pinnacles were such a large formation and we all found the sight quite impressive.  The above picture is a shot of some of the smaller ones.  We had been hoping to get out to see a few more things over the weekend, but Arden was sick coming home on Saturday, so we ended up using the car for useful things- shopping, visiting IKEA, etc.

This week has seen Arden working through some more Grimm's fairy tales, and the letters, 'j', 'x' and 'w'.  We're coming towards the end of the consonants- though we won't be doing the last few til after the baby is born.

Gabriel has been working on heat this week, in physics.  Everyone does tend to enjoy doing the physics, and now that Arden is 5 (compared to being 3 when I did it with Willow) he's enjoying sitting around and seeing what sort of things we're doing too.  We did a variety of things including feeling flames, making hands cold, looking at how things burn.  The experiment that is pictured, is from looking at convection currents - it doesn't show up quite so nicely in the pictures, but it gives the idea a bit.

This is one of Gabriel's zebra sketches from this week.

Willow has been sorting out accounts for her business project this week- looking at etsy, PAYPAL and ebay.  Plus she's still working on the first part of her history block- writing and researching about William of Orange.

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2025

Both the younger two have been involved in classes that are, from a schooling point of view, way above their level.  Now that they are both older it is quite apparent that it has made their comprehension of certain topics quite advanced, due to the early exposure.  

Due to this, and also because of our early years home educating in Adelaide, where the home education scene was much more multi-generational natural learning inclined than Perth, which IMO is much more age group restricted, and school inclined, one of the aspects I have really come to value in home education is multi- generational learning.  If a child has an interest, or a passion, and they meet someone who shares that, age becomes completely irrelevant, as that topic becomes the priority in the relationship.  

I look back now, at all the incidental learning that I did with my Dad, and I realise that we were home educating/ natural learning /life learning almost whenever I hung out with him.  He was always prepared to answer my questions, expand my understanding, and demonstrate, pretty patiently, whatever he was doing.  These are some of my fondest learning memories, and I came to see through my home educating experience that there were some things, that were much easier for the kids to do, if they had me by their side having a go too. 

Poetry

Willow has been getting into doing poetry recently, and has her own poetry blog now.

Here it is.
http://theblogofpoems.blogspot.com.au/

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2025

So it seems Willow has taken down her poetry blog.  Being into music as she is, poetry seemed a natural extension to explore.  Many people complain about it being pointless, but seem to lack comprehension that modern music lyrics, are poetry, accompanied by sound.

Some examples of Willow's poetry can be found here.

https://unicorn-pegasus.blogspot.com/2011/09/holiday-time.html

https://unicorn-pegasus.blogspot.com/2014/02/the-face-of-fear-by-willow.html

Arden trialing poetic writing.

https://unicorn-pegasus.blogspot.com/2017/09/a-collection.html

Poetry resources from when Arden was learning to write poetry.  The Stephen Fry book "The Ode Less Travelled" has been popular around here.

https://unicorn-pegasus.blogspot.com/2019/09/term-2-part-2.html

Since living in Glasgow we celebrate Burn's night here, with a small bit of poetry reading, usually after we've been to the Australia day fireworks, since they are quite close together.  Since we have Scottish heritage- Damien is Scottish, and I have some Scottish ancestry, it's nice to keep some of the culture within the family.

https://unicorn-pegasus.blogspot.com/2018/04/summer-holidays-finally-here.html

Some Highlights from this Past Week

This past week has seen us reading 'The Golden Goose'.  Arden has liked this story much better than Rapunzel, and we only worked on two letters this week, so there was some extra time for modelling.  Since we were working on the letters 'b' and 'k' and Arden was curious how they sounded together, we decided to put some vowels in the middle, and made the word 'book'.

This is Arden's painting of the king from the Golden Goose- using the 'k' to make the king.

Willow has been experimenting with weaving on our new square loom, as part of her craft project for this term.

We've also been setting up an etsy account that she can sell some craft stuff on, as part of her main project this year.  Her project is focusing on creating her own small craft business.  She had her first market stall for this year, selling her brooches at City Farm for mothers day, and we're now looking at ways that she can sell online too, as well as other projects that she might like to try selling.

This is from Gabriel's geometry from last and this week, dividing a square into halves and thirds, and extending the pattern.

Gabriel has still been working on physics this week- we've been looking at light.  There's been some fun experiments with colour, and light and darkness this week.

Finally I came home tonight to find Arden playing his own special version of pinball.  Gabriel came up with the layout, and Arden added the flips-  I thought this was very cool!

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2025 

Willow didn't progress far with the craft business.  She ran the stall for a while, but people were interested in her things being cheap, and since she was using pure wool, it didn't progress far.  I'm not sure what happened with the etsy account now.

At this point she was still busking regularly- most likely flute, and she was pretty happy with how much money she made from that.  When she was older she would sing, and later she gave up busking, and after completing her Diploma in 2017, she worked in a cafe for a year.

Willow's Chemistry and Craft

Epsom salt crystalisation, on glass.  The second version has been backlit.

Experiment with salt that got neglected and crystalised quite impressively.

Progress on Willow's rag doll.  she's really coming along now- but would probably like some arms!

Closer

Time is progressing along, and I'm starting to feel quite pregnant.  So it was nice over the holidays to take it very quiet this time.  Willow spent the second week volunteering at City Farm, as she often does, and really enjoyed it again this time.  Gabriel, Arden and I had a fairly quiet time, and we managed to also catch up with some friends.

Some of the classes we've been doing ran over the holidays, so we still had a few of those outings happening.  Willow's flute classes were still happening, and we all kept up with our dancing lessons with Cool Cats- rockabilly and kick step.  We managed to also get out and see a demonstration of Swing Dancing at Northbridge piazza on Anzac day, and Damien was asking them about swing dancing at the Mustang Bar.  Willow and Gabriel also got out to use their second surfing lesson, and both found it a little more familiar this time; I'm thinking it might be worth organising surfing lessons for them both over next summer, and finally getting Arden onto swimming lessons.

So we all started back into school routine for the next little bit, before the baby is due this week.  Willow is finishing off some chemistry with Damien, Gabriel and I have been doing physics and Arden and I are doing some more stories, and letters.  This week saw Gabriel and I working on sound, with a selection of experiments out of Physics is Fun by Robert Trostli.  We looked at instruments, and objects that would create and allow sound to travel.  Arden listened to 'Rapunzel', and we focused on the letters, 'f', 't' and 'p' this week.

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2025

We never did end up doing more surfing.  Arden learnt to swim at home in our pool, and Irving did too mostly, but has also done some vacswim classes, and enjoyed them so much that he has been doing nippers the last two years.

Irving at nippers a couple of years ago.

https://unicorn-pegasus.blogspot.com/2023/12/end-of-term.html

Nippers and swimming last year.

https://unicorn-pegasus.blogspot.com/2024/04/welcome-to-2024-four-months-in.html